When Madison gets its pockets shaken out

In Microtones, our newsletter-first column. 

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MICROTONES by Chris Lay, associate publisher 

Happy moving season! Or, as we in Madison call it, “Hippie Christmas.”

This “holiday,” as many, if not all of you are aware, is due to a profound majority of rental leases across town ending on either August 1 or 15. This means loads of Madison’s unlanded population might be reappraising which of their great many possessions deserve to make the cut and come along to their new life, be it across town or simply across the street. What falls by the wayside, or merely doesn’t fit in the U-Haul, well, that ends up on the curb.

Cheap IKEA futons. Third-hand recliners. Coffee tables. George Foreman grills. Half-finished canvases from a sophomore-level art class. The city basically gets lifted up and shaken by a bully, and whatever falls from its pockets ends up piled waist-high in a two-mile radius around campus.

To the untrained eye, this annually recurring post-apocalyptic wasteland of shit may be something of a blight, but there’s gold in them thar hills of dormitory detritus. Tone Madison contributor Chali Pittman found this adorable little mug that is most likely a lemon, but it also might be the bottom of a pineapple or… possibly an ear of corn? Whatever he is, he looks like one hell of a cool dude who will now be giving her an approving thumbs up to go with her afternoon caffeine fix.

We’re looking to hear from our readers this about the great and/or insane stuff that they find this year. The babies discovered amid so much of Madison’s bathwater, as it were. Think of it as Madison’s own day of wealth redistribution if you want to, and we wanna see you tittering in the face of capitalism while holding some wacky and/or useful trophies. Send me your finds and photos at chris@tonemadison.com, or tag us in your Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram posts of same.

If you’re moving, we certainly encourage you to get as much of your cast off junk as you can to places like St. Vincent de Paul or Goodwill, for obvious landfill-overstuffing reasons, but hey, we’ve all been there trying to get everything out the door as the clock ticks down and… good lord, does the oven still need to be cleaned?!

Good luck out there to everyone who’s either in the final stages of moving out of or into their new homes, and we look forward to seeing the strange stuff you snatch from the jaws of whatever Hippie Santa is to you and yours.

New this week:

On the podcast: A conversation with Lykanthea, who plays our concert series on August 19 at Arts + Literature Laboratory.

The jazz club Café Coda is getting ready to reopen on Willy Street. 

Elsewhere on the Madison internet: The Simpson Street Free Press strikes a blow for transparency. The Wisconsin State Journal covers Madison’s cops-at-Pride controversy. WORT explores the opening of a new “mural alley.” Stand-up Dan Bacula releases his latest mixtape, part of a series he spoke with us about last year.

This week’s Madison calendar: Sam Jay’s brutally vulnerable stand-up at the Comedy Club on State. Binary Marketing Show’s electro-pop reveries at Mickey’s Tavern. Tani Diakite at the Eken Park Festival. And more.